. >> any time israel is involved in a story it, becomes an excruciatingly difficult story for american journalists to cover because there is a -- for the most part -- a natural sympathy in this country, a sense of identity in this country with israelis and many reporters, old friends and colleagues of mine, the late peter jennings, used to, i think, very unfairly be criticized for taking an anti-israeli point of view. it wasn't so much an anti-israeli point of view as that he had spent many years living in the arab world and had a sympathetic point of view to arabs. i think what is happening in gaza right now meets almost any definition of tragedy. the israelis cannot be expected, on the one hand, to stand by while their cities are rocketed. on the other hand, the great irony, the paradox in that story is because the i.d.f., the israeli defense forces, are infinitely more professional than hamas fighters, the number of casualties on the palestinian side are always going to be much greater, thereby leaving an impression that there's somehow something unfair about the war. this is precis